We live in a culture selling us a belief of scarcity. We are taught to believe that there is not enough of things that are deemed as socially important like status, power, and money. That belief in turn creates a society full of comparison, judgment, blaming, shaming, and disengagement. Marketing tells us constantly that we are not young enough, rich enough, thin enough, strong enough, perfect enough; we are not enough. And on a subliminal level, these messages get in. The scarcity mindset then spreads to create a belief that love, compassion, belonging, and connection are available to us only in limited amounts as well.
This is why some people are so triggered into fear at the thought of equal rights. The belief has been cultivated that equal means less for them.
Along with the beliefs that there is not enough and we are not enough, we are taught to default our individual well-being to other people and to trust others more than ourselves. We ask other people what is right for us, how we should live our lives, and what decisions we should make about our health, finances, jobs, and family.
When we add in trauma and a nervous system that is out of balance, which is the norm rather than the exception, we experience even more self-doubt and on-going anxiety. As we are living in a lifestyle of fear, scarcity, and anxiety, and reaching for things outside of us to calm an inner storm, we are seeing the breakdown of health with overwhelming numbers of autoimmune disfunction, digestive distress, heart disease, and diabetes, to name just a few common issues.
We are a culture out of rhythm with nature. We ignore the signs and signals of our bodies, we eat processed foods that the body doesn’t know what to do with, we resist the need for sleep and rest, and we numb out with excessive levels of all kinds of things from substances to technology to busyness.
So, what do we do about it? First we must lean into courage as we recognize that this will not be a smooth and easy journey. Honoring and taking care of ourselves proves to be counter-culture in many ways. We must be brave enough to choose our own mental/emotional/physical/spiritual health first and to be open to trusting ourselves rather than defaulting to what the cultural norm is.
Next, we must begin to practice compassion for ourselves and for others. We must invite ourselves to let go of judgment and criticism and lean into kindness, recognizing that we are all human and we all experience many similar thoughts and feelings. This is where we examine our perspective of the world around us and notice how we talk to ourselves and others. This includes the practice of seeing our similarities rather than our differences, feeling our feelings, and recognizing that we don’t have to prove or hustle for our worth; we have worth simply because we are our unique selves.
Finally, it is all grounded in connection to our authenticity, to our values, to nature, to our universe, and to each other. As humans, we are wired for connection and scarcity mindset sets us up for disconnection, disengagement, and isolation. We must tune in to get to know and love ourselves and reach out to get to know and love others in order to heal.
We must recognize that it is possible to live in rhythm with our mind-body system, with nature, and with the abundance that is all around us.
This week, I invite you to notice messages of scarcity from around you and from within. Notice how these messages set you up for disconnection, isolation, and contraction. And bravely experiment with replacing those messages of scarcity with messages of abundance. There is enough love, compassion, and connection for everyone, and that is what makes us wealthy and healthy.
I will be noticing and experimenting right along with you.
Chat again soon,
k